The Art Dept by VWFA presents:A Matter of Life and DeathA Solo Exhibition by Eiffel Chong

Malaysian photographer Eiffel Chong presents his signature series A Matter of Life and Death at the Art Dept by VWFA. As a selection of visual short stories, he comments on the excesses of globalization, the deterioration of a society driven by materialism over community, economic prosperity over natural preservation.

Chong begins with an intuitive documentation of places inspired from his research or arbitrary wanderings around Malaysia. Visually drawn to the connection between objects in space he creates dramatics mysteries that weave together memory, nostalgia and dystopian dreams. After scrutiny and reflection, surreal narratives are then inferred through a careful choice of titles which suggest melancholia, alienation, and states of collapse.

For A Matter of Life and Death each image presents an alternative type of lament towards the negative excesses of capitalism that exploit landscape and community for commercial gains. Visually Chong’s work monumentalises silence through his personal sense of disillusionment and imagined memories. Whether buildings in progress, empty billboards, clinical interiors or seductive trees each exudes a type of narrative tension, the anxiety of what could happen next.

"These images are stories of long forgotten memories, or places that are hidden from the public. Each story gives rise to another memory, anecdote, or tirade against an imagined enemy. Though it is only fictional and sometimes historical, it still acts as a warning to us: We can make mistakes; we can lose all this; our world could something of the past if we are not careful." Eiffel Chong.